On the beginnings of the Constantinopolitan School of embroidery

Abstract

This paper examines Greek-Orthodox ecclesiastical embroidery in Ottoman Constantinople after 1453 until the emergence of the Constantinopolitan School of embroidery. We are well informed about the artistic production that flourished between the last decades of the seventeenth century and midnineteenth century via preserved artifacts and inscriptions bearing the embroiderers’ signature. Nevertheless, our knowledge of the production between the fall of Byzantium and the last decades of the seventeenth century is lacking. In this paper, our aim is to evaluate whether the Byzantine artistic tradition continued to live in the Greek Constantinopolitan production. The iconographical and technical analysis of different artifacts will give the answer to this question revealing at the same time the foundation basis of the embroidery of that School.